Adam braced himself, fighting instinctive reluctance as he worked to reveal the body hidden by the thick underbrush. It was a woman. The material over her ample bosom was covered with blood. It was stiff and brown, testifying that the fatal wound had been delivered some time ago.
He pushed back the stubborn bracken until he saw her face. A wave of reaction ripped up from his stomach. He had to force himself to look at the round eyes that stared straight up, sightless in death. Kimberly’s frizzled red hair lay all around her in the dirt.
She had been stabbed—that was apparent, as the handle of the murder weapon still protruded from her neck.
Adam’s heart stopped for a moment as he focused on that instrument. He blinked, trying to clear away what was surely a trick of his eye…. No. God, no.
He reached for the knife and pulled it out. It slid easily, with no gush of blood or a single sound other than a crisp gliding noise. It lay in his hand, the thin blade encrusted with rust-colored stains. The distinctive handle, however, was unmarred.
He recognized it. Anyone would. It was an exquisite medieval dagger that usually resided on the desk in the drawing room, the one at which Helena sat to see to her household duties or attend to her correspondence. It was kept as a seal breaker for letters. He himself had seen Helena wield it several times.
Cain’s whine broke the preternatural quiet of Kimberly’s unhallowed grave. Adam started, his head snapping up. Sweat soaked his body, plastering the linen shirt to his back and clammily grasping at the woolen riding breeches so that they clung to his thighs. With less care than he had entered, he backed out of the bush.
He still held the knife in his hand. It felt like it weighed a thousand stone. Straightening, he looked at it for a long moment before slipping it in his pocket.
He had no idea what he was going to do with it. He only knew he didn’t want it lying around for discovery when they came for Kimberly’s body.
“I’m glad you’re feeling better,” Lord Rathford said to his daughter. He looked at Helena a bit balefully, and she assumed it was because he had heard about the dolls. She’d smashed them all. No doubt this confirmed everyone’s certainty of her insanity.
Raising her chin a notch, she replied, “I feel wonderful.”
“Good. Good.” Rathford frowned, not at all pleased. “I, ah, I wanted to talk to you, button. About Mannion.”
He was nervous. That alone raised Helena’s interest. “Yes?”
They were in the library. Her father was seated behind the large mahogany desk. He now drew a folded piece of paper from beneath the blotter. “There is no gentle way to tell you this. Would that there were.” He paused, then held up the paper. “I received this from Howard.”
Helena held out her hand and her father gave it to her. “You can read it for yourself, but apparently Mannion has made inquiries into getting control of your trusts.”
“What?” Helena exclaimed, hurrying to open the letter.
Rathford nodded regretfully. “Howard tells me he’s been pressuring the trustees of the banks to relinquish guardianship of the money.”
“That’s absurd. That money is mine, protected from my husband under the terms of the trust. He knows that.”
“I was told that he…” Rathford shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He gave a shrug, then winced. “He, ah, he says he has grounds to declare you incompetent.”
“How so?” she demanded with indignation.
“He claims…you’re…insane. That is the basis of his case.”
“How does Howard know this?”
“One of the bank trustees isn’t as discreet as he could be. Someone talked, and Howard’s heard tell of your…eh, condition. Supposed condition.”
“It can’t be….”
Rathford sighed. “I could make other inquiries, speak to the trustees myself. Perhaps Howard heard wrongly….”
It was too humiliating, the desperate platitudes she heard in her father’s voice. “No. Please, don’t involve anyone else.”
Rathford’s voice was gruff when he spoke. “Helena…I know you hoped he’d be more. Christ, I hoped…Ah, bloody hell, it doesn’t matter. He’s a fortune hunter, plain and simple. He never claimed to be anything else.”
“Then you believe it?”
Rathford seemed to struggle with an inner war. “Do you?”
Her gaze fell, and as the breath left her body, all the strength fled as well. “It doesn’t seem like Adam. He’s always been so forthright about his motives.”
“That we know of,” Rathford amended.
Brow creased, Helena allowed the comment to stand. “I suppose I should ask him.”
“I’ll do it,” Rathford said, a gleam of violent anticipation in his eyes.
“No.” Helena came to her feet, ready with more to say, but paused as Rathford made to rise as well. He suddenly stopped. He seemed to be in some pain. “Father?”
Then all at once, his features collapsed and he reflexively threw his hands out, grasping for something to hold on to. Helena acted swiftly, coming to tuck her shoulder under his outstretched arms. She braced her legs to bear his greater weight. “Father! Father, what is it?”
“Damnation and bloody hell!” he exclaimed. “Get me to the divan.”
“Lean on me,” she urged, hobbling under the weight.
“Christ!” he groaned, doubling over and nearly dragging Helena to her knees. “Get my medicine.”
“What medicine? My God, you are ill?”
“It’s…ah, hell, child. Let me lie down here and just call Charlie and Philip.”
Helena’s coolness of a moment ago was gone completely. Her voice came, high and shrill with burgeoning panic. “You are in terrible pain.”
His voice was strangled. “Not this bad before. The medicine, girl. Now. In the desk. Go.”
She turned on her heel and fled to do what he asked. Tears ran, scalding hot, down her cheeks as she fumbled with the drawers, finally finding the laudanum.
Laudanum. She remembered someone asking her—was it Mrs. Kent?—if she’d taken a tincture of opium, that her symptoms had at times put one to mind of someone taking laudanum—sleepy, disoriented, headachy and nauseous. She remembered replying with the observation that there was none in the house.
She pushed the thought aside and rushed back to her father. She administered the dose with shaking hands, calling for the menservants her father had requested. When the medicine was given and her father borne up to his bedroom, cursing and gasping with pain in turns, Helena pulled a chair up to his side and took his hand.
“I’m dying, button,” he said to her in a quiet voice.
Tears sprang to her eyes. “Don’t say that, Father.”
“I’ve known for some time. The pain started months ago. Drink dulled it for a while. Then it seemed to make it worse.” He turned his head on the pillow and looked at her softly. “It always made you so angry when I was drunk.”
“I thought…I thought—”
“I know,” he replied. “You thought I ceased to care about you. I tell you, I’ve never stopped loving you more than my very own life. You’re my child, my little daughter.” He stopped. Helena saw the muscles in his throat contract. “I had hoped Mannion would take care of you for me. When I’m gone. A father likes to know his child is being provided for, loved. I didn’t want to leave you alone in the world.”
“Oh, Father. Is that why you chose him?”
“It was the only thing I could see to save you from this cursed life you were determined to live. He did seem to do it, too, for a while.” His face turned bitter in an instant. “Now I want to wring his worthless neck. I never thought he’d steal from you, hurt you like this. How can I bear to leave this earth when I know what he’s done?”
“Please don’t talk like that. You are not leaving. I’ve sent for the surgeon.”
“Bah. The man’s an idiot. One thing Mannion did right was banish him from you when you were ill.”
A strange, n
agging thought niggled at the edges of her awareness. She didn’t have time to search it out.
Rathford drew in a pain-racked breath. “Let us say our goodbyes now, Daughter. I don’t want you to remember me like this, helpless, an invalid.”
“I won’t go.”
“I’ll have John drag you out if you don’t.” He tried to sound stern, but he was too weak. “Now say farewell.”
“I won’t go,” she cried, clinging tighter to his hand.
“Helena,” he said gently. “Leave me my dignity.”
There was a short silence. Then quickly, before she could change her mind, Helena got up and quit the room.
Chapter Thirty-Two
When Adam entered the house, he was greeted by Mrs. Kent, who asked to speak to him in the family withdrawing room. With his hand over the murder implement secreted in his coat, he followed her lead, only half paying attention.
“Lord Rathford has taken ill. He refused the surgeon.”
The news caught his attention. “Is it serious?”
“Indeed, sir, I know he is in a great deal of pain and…” She swallowed, and continued in a thin voice. “Well, sir, he expects to die. He has said as much.”
Adam ran his hand through his hair, fingers digging into the scalp. “Good God. I’ll go see him immediately.”
“He wishes to see no one, but says he shall have a final letter for you. He is working to put his affairs in order.”
Adam shook his head, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Where’s Lady Helena?”
“The master sent her out. She’s terribly upset, sir. She’s in her rooms.”
“I’ll go right away to check on her.”
“Oh, no, sir, not there,” Mrs. Kent said quickly. “Not in her bedroom suite. She’s up in the old nursery and schoolroom. Playing the pianoforte, I suppose.”
But Helena wasn’t playing, Adam discovered when he entered the tower rooms. She was standing against a wall, arms wrapped around herself. He made to go to her, and as he crossed the wood floor, his eyes caught the heap of debris in the corner.
“What happened?” he asked, detouring to inspect the mess. He paused, then looked at Helena. “Did you do this?”
“I did it.” She looked at him, sullen and angry. “My mother is dead. I don’t want to live for her anymore. I don’t want to be like those dolls.”
He approached her cautiously. “Of course not.”
Her eyes flashed. “Don’t take that tone with me. Or look at me like that. I’m not insane. I didn’t destroy those dolls in a fit of lunacy, Adam. I did it because I was angry. I was furious. Do you know how many of those dolls I held and cuddled and played with as a child? Do you know how many of them even had a name?”
He stood mute, not sure of her all of a sudden. He had been prepared for her to be disoriented, as she had been before. However, she was looking directly at him, speaking sharply, clearly, and not at all confused.
“None,” Helena continued. “Not a one. They were trophies, beautifully crafted and meant only to look at, not to love. And that was how I was raised to be.”
As the words registered, he felt a dawning sense of horror. She looked so lovely, so fragile. The welling tears in her eyes made them look luminous, and the sight of them produced a physical ache in his arms to hold her.
She dragged in a staggered breath and said, “And my father was the only one who didn’t treat me like one of those dolls. He loved me. He didn’t always show it, he wasn’t always strong. I wish he had stood up to my mother. I wish things had been different. But…but he did love me. It’s only now when I’m going to lose him that I realize that.” Her face collapsed and her hands came to cover her mouth. “Oh, Adam, what am I going to do without him?”
Helena wasn’t thinking about the letter. With all that had happened with her father falling ill so suddenly, with his terrible talk of dying, she had forgotten the explosive revelations. However, she recollected the facts all at once as she saw Adam coming toward her. She held up her hand to ward him off.
“This should please you,” she said sharply, moving backward until she collided with the wall. She leaned up against it, letting it support her.
Again, that wary, suspicious look. Oh, he was a master, all right. One might think he actually cared. “Helena, what are you talking about? Your mood is so capricious.”
“Father dies. Then you can enact your little plan.” She waved her hand at the broken dolls. “Look, I’ve even furnished you with more proof. Lunatic Helena went off on one of her wild tantrums. And you didn’t even have to drug me this time.”
He made to step toward her, but she flung up both hands. “Keep away from me. I will scream, and there are still servants in this house who are loyal to me and will help me.”
“What exactly are you accusing me of?” His voice sounded so steady, so reasonable.
“Howard heard of your plan from one of the loose-lipped trustees.”
“What trustee? What are you talking about?”
“You play the innocent well, Adam. In fact, you make a very convincing devoted husband.” She tossed her head loftily. “You almost had me fooled. But you got greedy, and that always makes a man sloppy.”
He crossed his arms over his chest and regarded her steadily. “Are you going to tell me what this is all about?”
“Your little tricks with the laudanum. And the jewelry always coming up lost. You wrecked my mother’s rooms.” She stopped, her hand coming to her throat. “Good Lord, did you even set the stable fire and leave me out there, hoping I’d perish?”
“Did I…? What the devil has gotten into you? The stable fire? I was the one who sounded the alarm. I brought you in, stayed with you the whole night. This is—”
“Crazy?” she asked. “Yes. It does sound crazy. You’ve done a thorough job on that account. If I go to anyone to tell them about this, I’ll seem like an utter madwoman.”
“Are you telling me that you believe someone is trying to make it seem as if you are going mad? And I take it this someone is, in your mind, me?”
“No. Not somebody. You, Adam. No one else has any cause.”
He surged forward and demanded through gritted teeth, “And what exactly is my ‘cause’?”
She thrust her chin out, bringing her nearly nose-to-nose with him. “The money,” she answered bitterly. “The trusts that are in my name alone, protected from you.”
His eyes flared, then narrowed. “I see.”
“Yes. The only way you’ll get your hands on them is if I’m declared…” She swallowed.
“Mad,” he finished for her in a soft voice. “Christ, Helena, I don’t want your money.”
“Oh, really. This from the self-confessed fortune hunter.”
He looked affronted. “I never denied my motives for coming to Northumberland. But you surely understand how things have changed. I can’t believe you think me capable of this.”
“Then what is the explanation? Tell me.” There was more than a hint of desperation in her voice. Yes, she wanted to hear him give her another possibility, a thread of hope, anything not to believe he wasn’t what he seemed.
“God,” he muttered. In disgust, he turned away. At the door he paused, peering at her over his shoulder. “I don’t have any explanations. I have nothing to tell you except I’d never do anything to hurt you. Never, Helena.”
“I’m leaving,” she announced. “I’m going downstairs to await word about my father.”
“I’m coming with you.”
“Please don’t,” she said curtly.
“I am coming with you.”
In the drawing room, she kept her distance, sitting over by the large window. Adam went directly to her desk. She sneaked a look over her shoulder to see what he was doing. She saw he had her dagger, the one she used for opening letters. He seemed to be looking at it, then put it back in its place. When he turned, he saw her eyes on him.
“That is a lovely antique,” he said. He was staring at her
most intently. She pursed her lips and glared briefly. He shrugged, then sauntered over to a divan, collapsing upon it with an artless grace she never failed to find appealing.
“By the way, Helena, have you seen Kimberly lately?” he asked as he examined his fingernails.
Shaking her head, she sank back into a seat. She had lost interest in him for the moment. Her worries for her father were taking over again. She began to weep, this time silently and all alone. Adam sat on the divan and watched her.
The news that Lord Rathford wasn’t going to die came just after dawn the following day.
Mrs. Kent threw open the doors to the drawing room, the sound like a clap of thunder in the silence. Adam, who was still draped loosely over a divan, half in a doze, jumped a foot at the noise. Helena was slumped in a chair by the roaring fire. Sitting up straight, she asked, “Is there word, Mrs. Kent?”
Mrs. Kent clasped her hands together. “My lady, your father is much improved! Oh, he had a terrible time of it. The ailment was acute, but he seems to have passed the vile poisons out of his system.”
“What’s this? He’s improving?” Adam queried.
“Oh, but the illness, it was beastly, sir. I’ve never seen the like, not even with a woman in childbirth, but thank goodness it’s over now. He’s resting.”
“I want to see him,” Helena and Adam said in unison.
“Certainly, right away. Come, then.”
They went swiftly up to Lord Rathford’s room. It was a Spartan space, the wood furnishings dark with age, and battered. He had no care for style or comfort, giving the place a utilitarian atmosphere. Even his bed looked uninviting and small, barely holding the large form of the master of the house.
Rathford was sleeping. Disappointed, Helena turned to go. Adam grasped her by the upper arm. “Does your father believe what you do about me?” he whispered fiercely.
She blazed a challenge back at him. “He was the one who told me.”
Adam frowned. He released her. “Damnation,” he muttered. “I can’t figure what the devil is going on here. I’ve got to speak with him.”
“He needs his rest.”
“You go. I’ll wait.” He turned away, dismissing her.
The Sleeping Beauty Page 22
